


Just Because I Know It Doesn't Mean I Believe

by Saquira



Series: Lightbringer [1]
Category: Supernatural
Genre: Angels, Gen, God's A+ Parenting, Heaven & Hell, Human Lucifer
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2016-09-11
Updated: 2016-09-11
Packaged: 2018-08-14 11:06:53
Rating: Teen And Up Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 4,357
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/8011270
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/Saquira/pseuds/Saquira
Summary: <blockquote class="userstuff">
              <p>In 1979, the sun that marked the beginning of the 23rd of June rose into a cloudless sky above the city of Tomsk in Siberia. Had the forces of heaven and hell not been so preoccupied with the final steps of their many millennia of planning for The End, they may very well have noticed the birth of the bright soul that would one day deny them their Apocalypse.</p>
            </blockquote>





	Just Because I Know It Doesn't Mean I Believe

**Author's Note:**

> Having read several stories in which Lucifer is reincarnated as a human (generally as Sam or Dean Winchester) and then proceeds to help stop the apocalypse, I had an idea. What if Lucifer was reincarnated as a human, but one that the angels had no interest in, and then decides to not get involved in either furthering or stopping the apocalypse? Instead, Lucifer chooses to just stand by and see what heaven and hell does when the devil doesn't show up.
> 
> Where gender pronouns are concerned I'll be using them depending on what vessel the angel in question is using at the moment, which means that they'll change for several angels.
> 
> Now, Lucifer's reincarnation in this series is a bit different from Anna's. He's reborn with all of his former knowledge, but this means that he's initially sharing head-space with a human mind while she grows up and he comes to terms with his current situation. So, before Lucifer gets his grace back and their two minds are merged into one, I'll be referring to Lucifer with male pronouns and Elena with female pronouns. And while Elena is the one who's actually in control, the two of them are basically the same person and Elena will often be acting upon Lucifer's thoughts or instincts. 
> 
> This story takes place pre-season 1, and credits go to Whyte for beta reading it.

**Just Because I Know It Doesn't Mean I Believe**

 

In 1979, the sun that marked the beginning of the 23 rd  of June rose into a cloudless sky above the city of Tomsk in Siberia. Had the forces of heaven and hell not been so preoccupied with the final steps of their many millennia of planning for The End, they may very well have noticed the birth of the bright soul that would one day deny them their Apocalypse.

But, as the Winchester's would one day make note of, heaven and hell had eyes for little but any direct interference in their plans. And, at the end of the day, who would ever have expected _Lucifer_ to be reborn as a human child?

 _Childhood is strange_ , was the first coherent thought that ever passed through the head of one Elena Lyutov. Of course, it was not quite her thought. As a matter of fact, that thought belonged entirely to Lucifer. Lucifer, who watched with a detached sense of amusement as the small toddler with whom he shared a body was picked up and cuddled by the human that was clearly the child's mother. Elena was only a few months old by that time, and so Lucifer very rarely chose to pay attention to exactly what was happening around them. The child wouldn't understand much of Lucifer's input anyway, and the entity had a lot of thoughts to sort through now that he had escaped the torture of the Cage.

Despite his precautions, some things did bleed through between the two of them. Elena grew up expecting people to call her Luci, and found herself feeling disappointed when it didn’t happen even though her name had nothing in common with that nickname. She expected to hear far more voices than she did in the depths of her mind. And although Lucifer was there, he was still only one voice.

Though those who later realised that Lucifer escaped the Cage before it was opened would assume that God was the one who placed Lucifer in Elena's body, the archangel himself was very well aware of the fact that this was not so. For he had spent aeons in the Cage during which no other entity had even looked upon him, and he would have recognised the touch of his Father. Lucifer had indeed spent so long in the Cage that he had eventually learned how to hide his thoughts and pretend that he was of lesser power, which meant that the Cage's effects had to some degree lessened upon the archangel's form and allowed him to think properly for the first time in aeons. Lucifer had wasted no time at that point, and though he did not know how much time had passed on earth between the time he instructed Azazel in how to free him and when he'd finally managed to draw his mind away from his grace and the notice of the Cage to escape from Hell, he did know that the denizens of Hell would by that point be well under way with their work towards freeing him. It was not much, but it was something, and Lucifer could only hope that his grace would be somewhat intact by the time it was finally released and could make him whole again.

But in the meantime Lucifer hid his presence in the midst of Elena's mind, carefully making sure that his memories would not touch hers, and bided his time as he learnt about the humans around them.

* * *

Elena was eleven months old the first time she stood up on two legs and started walking. She had not crawled before that, as neither she nor Lucifer saw any point in the endeavour when it wouldn't gain them anything, and though he knew that walking so early was unusual for the creatures Lucifer found that the stimulation that a sitting child could find was not nearly enough to occupy him. So he only waited a little while longer after the girl's body was ready to begin walking, and then he showed her how to do it. By which he took control of the body they shared and simply walked, astounding her parents in the process. And though Lucifer would never admit it, there was a faint sense of pride and surprise when Elena's parents praised their efforts.

 _That's what parents do; they praise you when you're doing something good_ . The thought that Elena sent him was sudden and unwanted, but Lucifer did not allow her to hear his quiet response of; _and they punish you when you do something wrong_. Instead, his thoughts turned to family as he turned his attention away from their surroundings and let Elena take full control.

His memories of the time during which he'd carried the Mark that locked away the darkness were disjointed. His thoughts were even more so now when he had finally escaped the Cage, but he still remembered his brothers and sisters, he still remembered their Father and how he'd felt when they cast him down into Hell.

The memories of Michael, the oldest of Lucifers' siblings, the one entity with whom he shared a bond so strong that it rivalled his bond with their Father – rivalled and even surpassed, though that part Lucifer had only ever admitted to himself – those memories were both the best and the worst. Lucifer clearly remembered that time in the Beginning of his existence – when Michael and their Father had been all there was and Michael's black wings had been warm and inviting to Lucifer, the time when Michael had been both teacher and protector and before Lucifer had even begun to think of questioning anyone, much less their father – and Lucifers' memories of when Michael, his older brother, struck him down and cast him into hell were clearer still. And Lucifer could no more forgive than he could forget it had happened _._

Raphael, his younger brother who'd always been so stoic, proud silver wings that shone in any lightning and rarely provided any hints what so ever about what he was feeling. He who cherished listening and learning, and could never abide by Gabriels' pranks. Yet he'd always been ready to offer a healing touch whenever any of his siblings got hurt. He'd always stood by when his older brothers quarrelled, not getting involved and yet so very clearly on their elder brother's side. Lucifer had very much enjoyed annoying his younger sibling, never maliciously but always smirking triumphantly whenever he managed to provoke a reaction out of the other archangel.

And Gabriel, whose wings shone of the purest gold in all of creation, always Lucifers' baby brother, and always the one to break the tension after Lucifer and Michael had had another of their fights. He'd always been so happy, always wanting to make his siblings feel better. He'd had so much love for everyone, and how could they have expected him to do anything _but_ to run away when Lucifers' fall ruined _everything_. Their father's messenger, the one who judged the angels, and possibly the only one for whom Lucifer still only felt love.

Lucifer remembered the younger angels as well, how could he not? But they were never as prominent in his thoughts as the other archangels. Not even Azazel and Alistair, who'd followed him without hesitation when he'd rebelled against heaven. Not Gadreel, who had been imprisoned in heaven since the Fall for no other reason but the fact that he'd once trusted the Morningstar. At the end of the day Lucifer, much like Michael and Raphael, had never spent as much time with their younger siblings as Gabriel had and so he couldn't claim to have ever truly known them.

* * *

When Lucifer dreamt, when his consciousness drifted, he dreamt of the Cage.

The Cage was brought into creation to imprison and hold all the power of an archangel, and the prison had not been a sentient being, but an artefact alive and indeed able to adapt to the prisoner that was held within it. Able to adapt, but not to learn, it reacted to Lucifer’s actions, but not his intentions. Over aeons, that fact had eventually provided him the opportunity to trick the Cage, but Lucifer was all too aware of the fact that he had no idea of what shape his grace would be in when it was eventually returned to him.

The Cage was solitary confinement, locking powers that were never meant to be locked away or isolated away into darkness. Different from the Mark in that it did not seek to corrupt him, only to punish him. Locked in the Cage Lucifer had been forced to see the consequences of his actions, to see the creation of demons and the evil they wrought. Forced to watched over time as the angels who had followed him in the Fall lost their angelic powers and turned to demons, forced to watch as Eve became the mother of all evil and monsters and demons both overran the earth until the angels stepped in for but a while to stop them. He watched the creation of the hunters, and the Men of Letters. And he watched as Cain made use of the Mark bestowed upon him by Lucifer in one last attempt from the archangel to gain back everything that made him himself. As the Knights of Hell were created, and as Cain killed them all just as he'd once killed his brother to fulfil the terms of the deal that Lucifer had offered him.

All this he saw through bars as the Cage whispered to him; _you did this. For you, humanity suffers. For you, your siblings fall and turn on each other._ Pointing out everything that Lucifer had wrought, even as the effects of the Mark faded and he once again began to _feel_. As the darkness that had once been nestled so deeply into Lucifer's mind, so treacherously, faded until it was only a speck of red in his grace that would later appear as red in the eyes of his vessel. But the Cage did not know of his regret, the Cage did not care. Its only purpose was to punish, to hold the grace of the archangel that had been placed in its charge, and as it carried out its purpose Lucifer learnt not how to ignore the pain, but how to hide from the ever present being that was the Cage. Isolated from the Host, isolated from his brothers and his Father, the Morningstar that had once been so bright faded as the Cage tore at his grace and mind both.

Worst of all, for Lucifer, wasn't the isolation or the accusations thrown at him by the Cage. It was the constant and unyielding knowledge that everything he saw was _real_. Because the Cage could not lie, it had not been made to lie to its prisoner. It had been made only to hold and punish him, and nothing could ever be more painful than the truth.

* * *

Sometimes, when Elena slept and Lucifer's mind drifted, small snippets of memories would slip through the wall that Lucifer had so carefully constructed to keep Elena's mind safe and they'd wake screaming in terror at some horror that Elena could hardly comprehend much less see. When that happened the whole house would burst into activity, Elena's father and mother would both pick them up and hold them _oh so tight_ , and Lucifer would once again attempt to retreat away from their affection to protect Elena.

When she finally had enough of his retreat, when Elena's mind clung tightly to Lucifer and refused to let go until the memory that had prompted the horror was long gone and her parents had once again returned to their beds for the night, Lucifer for the first time felt warmth at the thought of their parents. For, as much as he might have wished to ignore it, Lucifer slowly began to recognise that for all their shortcomings as human beings Erica and Sergey Lyutov were good parents. For all that their father did during his working hours, for all the suffering he inflicted upon others, to Elena and Erica he was never anything but loving. And for that Lucifer slowly learned to love their parents in return.

* * *

When Elena started talking Lucifer let her say whatever she wished. The Morningstar knew very well that any interjection he wished to make would be said with perfect punctuation and as such would attract far too much attention to the two of them. Attention that Lucifer knew very well he'd rather avoid. For without his grace he had no way of protecting himself from undue attention, and if there was one thing Lucifer knew for certain about the denizens of hell, it was that they would not stand idly by if they were to discover his weakness.

In this, patience was the one key to his continued survival. And as much as it rankled, the Morningstar would simply have to trust that Azazel would succeed in his attempts to open the Cage. For what were a few more years in a toddler’s body compared to the aeons that he'd already spent caged beneath the earth?

* * *

Humans had never made much sense to Lucifer. Their fragile forms, hardly requiring any effort to break, the way that they could never resist trying something when they didn't know what was going to happen. Eve was only one of many splendid examples of that. All Lucifer had really done, at the end of the day, was to tell her the truth. He'd told her that eating the fruit wouldn't kill her or Adam, and they called him the _Serpent_ for it, the one title that never failed to make the Morningstar roll his eyes.

Not to mention that ridiculous tendency humans had to do anything for the people they cared about. Cain might have been the first to go to hell for someone else, but he certainly wasn't the last.

Even now, living amongst them, humans were no easier for Lucifer to understand than they'd ever been. Elena's family were the main point of contention in his mind.

It wasn't until she was nine years old that Elena and Lucifer found out exactly what it was that their father did for a living.

He would occasionally bring his work home with him, but always kept it confined to the privacy of his office. Paperwork was always kept safely locked away, especially after their parents realised how easy it was for Elena to get into things she weren't supposed to, and phone-calls were made behind locked doors.

But it wasn’t Elena’s talent for getting into things she shouldn’t have that changed her life. It was the insight that came with sharing head-space with an ancient being, and an errant comment from that very entity.

Being as young as she was, a nine year old Elena had never truly paid much attention to the people that came and went from her father’s office. If she hadn’t run straight into one of them, this would probably have continued.

Elena forgot why she was in such a hurry as soon as she knocked into the older man, and his hands landed on her shoulders to straighten her up and forced her to take a couple of steps back. “Watch where you’re going, little one,” the man uttered with a slight laugh as Elena raised her eyes to find his face, the apologetic smile on her face turning forced as she met his steely brown eyes with her own.

She took another step back when he let go of her, forcing her smile to stay despite the chill that wanted to steal down her back and refused to let her break his gaze. “I’m sorry, sir,” she uttered and he once again raised one of his hands, this time to pat her on the shoulder.

“Don’t worry about it.” He didn’t say anything more before turning away and heading down the corridor she’d been running down, but she found herself unable to look away even as her attention turned to Lucifer’s presence, for once at the forefront of her mind. _Well, I know where he’s heading._ Elena frowned at the thought, questioning it for a moment as her gaze slid over to the door to her father’s office that the older man must have come out of. _What does that mean?_ She questioned the presence from which she could still feel a slight hint of amusement. _Think about it, and you’ll see,_ was his only answer. So Elena did just that even as she continued at a more sedate pace along the corridor.

 _He was a bad man, wasn’t he?_ She received nothing but an encouraging mental push from Lucifer as she walked. _But why would he be in father’s office?_ She questioned silently, and Lucifer’s sigh was evident as he elected to answer.

_Because they were doing business, Elena. Do you not watch your father’s friends?_

_Well, no. Why would I?_ She paused in the corridor as another thought occurred to her. _Why would he be doing business with bad men? Does that mean… he’s bad?_

_Things are very rarely that simple, Elena. But you’ll see._

* * *

Two months after Elena’s brief conversation with Lucifer about her father and his friends, she was reading in the room next to her father’s office when she suddenly heard voices. The door separating the two was only slightly ajar, just enough so that the young girl would be able to hear clearly what was going on in the other room, but too small for anyone to realise that it was open unless they actually looked.

“Filipp, what news do you bring?” Elena stilled in her chair and closed her book as she heard her father speak up and the door leading into the office from the corridor was closed.

“Iakov has not yet paid his fee for the month to the _krysha,_ ” the other man answered, and Elena’s eyes widened exponentially. She quietly got to her feet, hugging the book to her chest as she carefully made her way closer to the door.

“Ah. We will wait until 8 o’clock this evening. If he has not paid by then, send someone to take care of it.”

“In what way?”

“In whichever way would be best. Iakov’s loss will hardly matter. Get the money, or make an example of him. I care little for which.” Elena had made her way right up to the door when her father finished, and footsteps preceded the opening and closing of the door to the corridor as her father let out a slight sigh. She was focusing too much on the closing door however, as she didn’t realise footsteps where approaching her hiding spot until it was far too late to find a new one. As it was, she’d only just stepped away from the door when her father swung it open and blinked down at her in surprise.

“Ah, Lena. What have I said about listening when people are visiting?” he questioned, his face taking on a resigned expression as she squirmed on the spot.

“Not to, unless you say I can,” she answered quietly, and he sighed before a slight fond smile slipped over his lips.

“Yes, myshka. Come here.” Elena only hesitated for a second or so before approaching her father, and he crouched down and laid an arm around her shoulder. “Did you understand what just happened?” She nodded. “I though so. You’ve always been far too clever.”

“You are not angry?” she questioned hesitantly as she met her father’s eyes, and he shook his head no before she’d even finished speaking.

“With you, myshka? Never. But do not tell your mother, please, she would not like to hear that you’ve listened to my meeting. And next time you are in the other room, speak up. This business is not for the ears of children.” The girl avoided his gaze as her cheeks were tinted scarlet, and the older man sighed. “Do you understand?” he questioned in a firmer tone as Elena finally looked up to once again meet his eyes.

“Yes, papa.”

“Good. Now run along, I’ve still got some things to attend to.” He gave her a last smile as he rose and steered her towards the door, and Elena only briefly resisted the push before voluntarily walking the rest of the way. When she reached the door and was just about to step through, Elena looked back at the last moment to find her father already bent over his desk. He raised it again after a moment or so when he felt her gaze on him, and Elena opened her mouth as if to speak before closing it again and keeping it closed.

“I love you very much, Lena, but I really do have to work now. I’ll see you at dinner, all right?” he questioned as he smiled kindly at her, and the girl nodded as she finally returned his smile with one of her own and stepped out, letting the door close behind her.

 _As I told you, things are very rarely that simple._ Lucifer’s thought brought her out of her current train of thought, and for a few moments Elena turned her attention inwards.

_I know. I think I understand now._

* * *

It was desperation that had first led him to try and escape from the Cage. Desperation and no small amount of fear, but also the old instinct to _live_.

Aeons of torture in the Cage had left Lucifer unable of even thinking of escape, but the discovery that he could hide from the Cage's influence changed that. That discovery changed _everything_.

Slowly but surely the Morningstar regained his ability to think, to plan. With that ability came a very sudden realisation that should he stay in the Cage, he would break, and the outcome that heaven and hell were so fervently working towards might just become a reality. Lucifer held no more love for humanity now than when he'd been locked in the Cage, but that did not necessarily mean that he wished all of them dead. Much less that he'd be willing to cause the genocide of the human race himself. In truth, after his escape from the Cage, he'd even come to love a few of them.

At the end of the day Lucifer loved humans, but not humanity, even though he would not admit even that anywhere but the deep recesses of his mind. If he did, his Father might hear, and Lucifer was not yet at that point at which his pride would allow him to admit anything of the sort.

* * *

Lucifer used to believe in God.

There had been no uncertainty in Heaven. No reasons to question or doubt. Not in the Beginning, at least. But Lucifer wasn’t too proud to admit that those thoughts had begun to creep into his mind even before their Father gave him the Mark to keep it safe, though they'd been nothing more than idle musings at that point.

And then Father had given him the Mark, and every bad thought that’d ever passed through Lucifer’s mind had suddenly been the only things he could think about. It’d allowed all his bad thoughts to grow worse while the good ones all but vanished, and no one realised how his actions became more and more malicious and Lucifer became withdrawn from the other Archangels. Or perhaps they did notice, and only elected to ignore it because they did not know what to do. Not even their Father had attempted to aid or understand him, and one of the Lightbringer's clearest memories since the Mark is the look on his Father's face when Lucifer first refused to bow down to humanity.

To most of Heaven that was when everything first started going wrong, that day that Lucifer refused their Father's command. But Lucifer knew better than anyone that it started far earlier than that.

Lucifer still believed, however, even when he was cast into the Cage, he still believed in his Father, in the might of God.

It had been aeons in the Cage when Lucifer first sent out a prayer towards his Father, when he swallowed his pride and admitted that he had been wrong. It had been almost another aeon when the Morningstar realised that no one was listening. When the Lightbringer realised that neither his Father nor his siblings would be coming for him, and it was at that point that Lucifer finally lost his faith in God. And that loss of faith was even harder to deal with than his memories of the Fall because angels were made to believe in God, angels were not supposed to lose faith. So what did it say about him that he did? What did that make _him_?

It wasn't until he finally escaped the Cage and began to share a body with Elena that Lucifer could finally come to terms with his loss of faith. Humans were strange, but many of them utterly rejected the mere idea of any deity. And yet they had accomplished so much, come so far. They persevered because they believed in nothing greater than the people around them. And that, that Lucifer could respect.

Losing faith could have been the beginning of the end for Lucifer, but Elena was there to prove to him that good people did exist and few of the people that surrounded her cared overly much for the involvement of any deity in their lives. And still they survived. They thrived even. And perhaps Lucifer could not understand what that loss meant for him, but he could come to terms with it. And it was for that reason that Lucifer could finally begin to accept that one does not need faith to live a good life or change the world. And, what's more, just because you know something is true it does not mean that you believe in it. That having faith and knowing something is not the same.

**Author's Note:**

> The series will join in with Supernatural at the beginning of season 5 when Lucifer gets her grace back, and then go on from there. If there’s any specific scene/episode in season 5 you want me to write about, feel free to say so. I’ve already got a lot of ideas for much of it, but it’s always interesting to hear what people think. 
> 
> Translations of the russian in the story:
> 
> myshka – mouse/little mouse (affectionate) I’m not quite sure if this is correct since I don’t talk russian, but if anyone who do would like to correct it, feel free to do so.  
> krysha – roof (protection racket)


End file.
